“The tea is ready,” Ayla said. “Does anyone need a cup?”
“Jaradal doesn’t have one. You should always remember to bring your own cup, Jaradal,” Proleva said, reminding her young son.
“I don’t need to bring my own cup here. Grandam has my own cup for me,” Jaradal said.
“He’s right,” Marthona said. “Do you remember where it is, Jaradal?”
“Yes, ’Thona,” he said, getting up and running to a low shelf and returning with a small cup shaped and hollowed out of wood. “Here it is.” He held it high to show everyone, causing delighted smiles from the assembled group. Ayla noticed that Wolf had moved from his customary spot near the entrance and was wriggling on his belly toward the boy with his tail held high, every motion of his body expressing his yearning to reach the object of his desire. The boy spied the animal, drank down his tea in a few gulps, then announced, “I play with Wolf now,” though he was watching Ayla to see what her reaction would be.
Jaradal reminded her so much of Dure, she couldn’t help but smile. The boy headed toward the animal, who made a whining yelp as he got up to meet him, then started licking Jaradal’s face. Ayla could tell that Wolf was beginning to feel comfortable with his new, though very large, pack, especially the child of the extended family and his friends. For Wolf’s sake, she almost felt sorry that they would be leaving so soon. She knew it would be hard on him to be faced with the many new people they would meet. It would be hard on her, too. Her excitement about the Summer Meeting was tinged with trepidation.
“This is very good tea, Ayla,” Zelandoni said. “You sweetened it with licorice root, didn’t you?”
Ayla, smiled. “Yes. It’s calming for the stomach. Everyone is so excited about leaving, I thought I should make something calming.”
“And it tastes good.” Zelandoni paused, considering her words. “It occurs to me, since we are all here, that perhaps you should show Joharran and Proleva your way of making fire. I know I asked everyone not to tell anyone else about it yet, but we are all going to be traveling together and they will see it anyway.”
Jondalar’s brother and his mate glanced at the others with questioning looks, and then at each other.
Folara smiled. “Should I put the fire out?”
“Yes, why don’t you,” the donier said. “It is more impressive to see it that way the first time.”
“I don’t understand. What’s this about fire?” Joharran said.
“Ayla discovered a new way to start a fire,” Jondalar said, “but it’s easier to show you.”
“Why don’t you show them, Jondalar?” Ayla said.
Jondalar asked his brother and Proleva to come to the cooking hearth, and after Folara smothered the fire, and other people put out the lamps that were near them, Jondalar used the firestone and flint and soon had a small fire started.
“How did you do that?” the leader asked. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Jondalar held up the firestone. “Ayla discovered the magic in these stones,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to tell you about them, but there’s been so much going on, I haven’t had time yet. We just showed Zelandoni, and not long ago Marthona, Willamar, and Folara.”
“Are you saying anyone can do that?” Proleva said.
“Yes, with practice, anyone can do it,” Marthona said.
“Yes, let me show you how the stones work,” Jondalar said. He went through the process, and Joharran and Proleva were amazed.
“One of those stones is flint, what is the other one? And where does it come from?” Proleva said.
“Ayla calls it a firestone,” Jondalar said, and explained how she happened to discover its properties. “We looked, but didn’t see any on the way back. I was beginning to think they could be found only in the east, then Ayla found some not far
from here. If there are some nearby, there should be more. We’ll keep looking. We have enough for all of us, but they could be significant gifts, and Willamar thinks they would be good to trade.”
“Jondalar, I think we’re going to have to have some long talks. I wonder just what else you haven’t told me. You go off on a Journey, and return with horses that carry you on their backs, a wolf that lets children pull his fur, powerful new throwing weapons, magic stones that make instant fire, stories about intelligent flatheads, and a beautiful woman who knows their language and learned healing from them. Are you sure there isn’t something else you’ve forgotten to tell me?” Joharran said.
Jondalar smiled wryly. “Not that I can think of right now,” he said. “When you put it all together like that, I guess it does sound rather unbelievable.”
“ ‘Rather unbelievable’? Listen to him!” Joharran said. “Jondalar, I have a feeling your ‘rather unbelievable’ Journey is going to be talked about for many years.”
“He does have interesting stories to tell,” Willamar admitted.
“It’s all your fault, Willamar,” Jondalar said with a grin, then looked at his brother. “Don’t you remember staying up late listening to him telling stories about his travels and adventures, Joharran? I always thought he was better than many of the traveling Story-Tellers. Did you ever show Joharran the gift he just brought you, mother?”
“No, Joharran and Proleva haven’t seen it yet,” Marthona said. “I’ll go get it.” She went into her sleeping room and returned with a flat section of palmate antler and gave it to Joharran. It was carved with two streamlined animals apparently swimming. They were fishlike, but not fish. “What did you say these were, Willamar?”
“They’re called seals,” he said. “They live in the water, but they breathe air, and come to shore to give birth.”
“This is remarkable,” Proleva said.
“Yes, it is, isn’t it?” Marthona said.
“We saw some animals like those on our Journey. They live in an inland sea far to the east,” Jondalar said.
“Some people think they are spirits of the water,” Ayla added.
“I saw another creature that lives in the Great Waters of the West that is thought of as a special spirit helper of the Mother by the people who live nearby,” Willamar said. “They are even more fishlike than seals. They give birth in the sea, but it is said they breathe air and nurse their young. They can stand on top of the water on their tails—I saw one do it—and it’s said they speak their own language. The people who live there call them dolphins, and some of them claim they can speak dolphin language. They made high squeaking sounds to show me.
“They tell many stories and legends about them,” Willamar continued. “It’s said they help people to fish by driving them into nets, and they have saved the lives of people whose boats have capsized far from shore, who would otherwise have drowned. Their Elder Legends say that all people once lived in the sea. Some of them returned to the land, but the ones who stayed behind became dolphins. Some call them cousins, and their Zelandoni says they are related to people. She’s the one who gave this plaque to me. They venerate the dolphin almost as much as the Mother. Every family has a donii, but everyone also has some dolphin object, a carving like that, or a part of the animal, a bone or tooth. It is considered very lucky.”
“And you said I had interesting stories to tell, Willamar,” Jondalar said. “Fish that breathe air and stand on their tails on top of the water. It almost makes me want to go with you.”
“Maybe next year when I go to trade for salt, you can come. It’s not such a long Journey, especially compared to the one you made,” Willamar said.
“I thought you said you didn’t want to travel again, Jondalar,” Marthona said, “and here you are, home only a short time and planning another trip. Have you developed a traveling urge? Like Willamar?”
“Well, trading missions aren’t exactly Journeys,” Jondalar
said, “and I’m not ready to make a trip now, except to the Summer Meeting, but a year is a long way off.”
Folara and Jaradal, curled up with Wolf on Folara’s bed, tried to stay awake. They didn’t want to miss anything, but with the wolf between them, listening to the stories and the soft buzz of conversation, they both fell asleep.
The next day dawned with a gray drizzle, but the summer shower didn’t dampen the enthusiasm of the Cave for the impending trek. Despite staying up late the night before, the members of Marthona’s household were up early. They made a morning meal of the food they had set out the night before and then finished packing. The rain eased up, and the sun tried to burn off the clouds, but moisture from the night’s accumulation on leaves and in puddles made the air foggy, cool, and damp.
When everyone who was going had gathered on the front terrace, they started out. With Joharran leading the way, they headed north, walking down from the stone front porch to Wood River Valley. It was a large party, much larger, Ayla observed, than the group from the Lion Camp when they went to the Mamutoi Summer Meeting. There were still many people Ayla did not know very well, but by now she at least knew almost everyone’s name.
Ayla was curious which way Joharran would go. From the ride they took on the horses, she knew that when they started, the floodplain valley on the right bank of The River—the Ninth Cave side—was broad. If they headed upstream along The River in its meandering but generally northeast direction, trees would be close to the water, and a wide expanse of grassy field separated The River from the highlands on both sides, and climbed up to the highlands in a gradual slope. However, after a short distance, water hugged steep cliffs on the other side, the left bank, which was on the right-hand side as one traveled toward the source. “Left bank” and “right bank” were terms that always referred to the sides of rivers when going downstream in the direction of the flowing current. They were traveling upstream.
Jondalar had told her that the next closest community of Zelandonii was only a few miles away, but that they would need a raft to complete the trip if they stayed close to The River because the course of the waterway changed. Farther upstream it curved in a more northerly direction, and the lay of the land forced the water to the wall of the cliff on the right bank, their side, with no space for even a narrow path after it turned north, and finally east again before the next abri was reached. The people of the Ninth Cave usually took an overland route to visit their nearest northern neighbors.
The leader turned up the path beside the Wood River tributary to the shallow crossing, then cut directly across Wood River Valley. Ayla noticed that they were not following the route she and Jondalar had taken with the horses shortly after they arrived. Instead of cutting across to the narrow valley with the steep, dry streambed, Joharran took a trail that was parallel to The River, leading to the flat lowlands of the right bank. They turned left through grass and brush and started up the gradual slope, then switchbacked in a zigzag up the face of the highland.
Ayla kept track of Wolf out of the corner of her eye as he ran ahead, following his nose. She recognized most of the plants she saw and registered in her mind their uses and where they were growing. There’s a stand of black birch over there by The River, she thought, the bark can help prevent miscarriage, and here’s some sweet rush, which can cause one. And it’s always good to know where willow grows; a decoction of the bark is so good for headaches, and the aching bones of the elderly, and other pains. I didn’t know there was marjoram around here. It makes a nice tea, adds a good flavor to meat, and it’s good for headaches, too, and helps a baby’s colic. I’ll have to remember this for later. Dure didn’t suffer from colic much, but some babies do.
The trail steepened as they reached the sharper incline near the top, then opened out to the high level field. When they reached the windy plateau, she walked a ways ahead to the edge, then stopped to rest and wait for Jondalar, who was having a little trouble leading Racer and his travois up the
steep, rocky path with the abrupt turns. Whinney cropped a few blades of fresh grass while they waited. Ayla adjusted the mare’s pole drag and checked the load she carried in panniers and on her back, then stroked her and talked to her in the special horse language. Ayla looked down at The River and its floodplain, and the long line of people, young and old, straggling up the trail, then the view beyond.
The elevated plateau offered an expansive panorama of the surrounding countryside, and a misty, illusionary scene below. A few wisps of fog were still tangled in the trees near the water, and a shroud of soft white concealed The River in places, but the veil was lifting, revealing shafts of light from the brilliant orb glinting from the surging stream. Across in the distance, the fog thickened and the limestone hills faded into a gray-white sky.
When Jondalar arrived with Racer, they started across the high plateau together. Walking with the tall man with whom she had Journeyed for so long, with the wolf at her heels and the horses pulling the pole drags following close behind, Ayla was euphoric. She was with the ones she loved most and could hardly believe the man beside her would soon be her mate. She remembered only too well her feelings during the similar trek they had made with the Lion Camp. Then, she had felt that every step she took brought her closer to an inevitable destiny she did not want. She had promised to mate a man she truly cared for, and might have been happy with, if she hadn’t met and loved Jondalar first. But Jondalar had become distant, didn’t seem to love her anymore, and there was no doubt that Ranee not only loved her, but wanted her desperately.
Ayla had no such adverse feelings now. She was so filled with happiness, she felt sure it overflowed and suffused the air around her, permeating the ground she walked upon. Jondalar was also remembering the trip to the Mamutoi Summer Meeting. The problem had been his jealousy and his fear of facing his people with a woman who might not be acceptable. He had resolved his problems and was no less full of joy than she. Then, he had been sure Ayla was lost to him for ever,
but here she was beside him. and every time he looked at her, she looked back at him with eyes full of love.
They followed the trail across the level highland that took them to another viewpoint at the cliff’s edge, where they had stopped when they were there alone. Before they crossed the small stream, they paused to watch the thin waterfall dropping over the edge into The River directly below. The people of the Cave had spread out across the high field, some making their own trail. The walkers took with them only what they could carry, though packs could be heavy and some planned to go back to get a second load, usually of items they wanted to trade.